Merry Pig-mas!

So yesterday, the kids got an invite to a friend’s house for a few hours in the afternoon.  I dropped them off around two and that gave me three hours to wrap presents and finish up Christmas stuff, since I’d been sick all week with an unidentified flu-like illness.  The friend lives just around the corner, so I drove down the side of our pasture on my way to drop them off.  The horses were over by the fence and I noticed Sugar and Lucky were by the horses.  Lucky was supposed to be in his pen, so I wondered how he got out, but there was another dog there too, wasn’t there? 

I got home, put Lucky up and commenced to wrapping presents and watching HGTV upstairs in my bedroom.  After about an hour, my back could take no more, so I went downstairs and had a little break checking Facebook. 

My neighbor wrote: Just finished the big neighborhood pig roundup.  My Christmas present to you Mickie.  :)  

To which I replied: Are you freaking kidding me?

Lucy, the WonderPig, had apparently had enough of the confined life and decided to take a tour around the neighborhood.  She ended up in Sugar’s backyard and thank goodness my neighbor saw her.  He and his family rounded her up and brought her back home to her pen behind the barn.  She’d apparently worked on the cattle panels that make up the fence on the west side of the barn and pushed them so that they looked more like a teepee propped up on the telephone poles that are the infrastructure of the barn. 

This just after Wednesday, when she decided to heck with the chain link gate and shoved her way right out of it.  We now have chains on everything around here.  It’s like Alcatraz for animals. 

On Wednesday, she stayed in the backyard, while I ran around her in circles screaming at the kids to “get the dogs”, “come help me”, “NO!”, “get out of the WAY!!”  Nothing puts me in a panicked, screaming mood like a loose animal.  I’m surprised someone didn’t call the cops, thinking someone was being murdered over here.   

What we learned on Wednesday was to always hook the chain on the gate, and that I run about as fast as a 3 ½ month old pig. 

Anyway, my neighbor must have been quieter in his escapades, or I had the TV turned up way too loud, because I was totally oblivious to the whole situation! 

I wrapped up my wrapping and covered my tracks and then headed out to check on the barn situation.  The entire 20 ft. or so made up of cattle panels was leaning precariously.  There was a foot wide gap at one end that I thought the pig could have surely fit easily through, so I thought she was out again! 

Please God, don’t let the pig be out again!

“Luuuccccyyyy…” I called.

And out steps a very sleepy pig from the chicken house where she sleeps.  She’d been taking a nap!  Too much excitement, I guess. 

So I corral her back in the chicken house and lock her in so she won’t be doing any escaping before I get the fence put back up and wired in place.  Sounds easier than it really was…

By this time, I had to go pick up the kids.  I told the mom over there about the pig escape.  Her older daughter and the dad had gone to Wal-Mart earlier and the daughter said, “I saw a pig on our way to the store!  I said, ‘Dad, look, it’s a REAL LIVE pig!’”

Great.

Lucy the pig. 

Neighborhood celebrity.

I don’t know how long she was out, or where her travels took her, but it was exciting nonetheless. 

And embarrassing.

Stupid pig. 

My 9YO and I worked until dark wiring the panels back in place.  I should say we worked until my helper’s hands got too cold and until mine hurt from bending wire in place.  I was feeling like a farmer last night!

This morning, we go out to inspect our pig-proofing.  We also took Lucy an old bowling ball to play with at the advice of another Facebook friend who has raised pigs for years.  Said she might be bored.    

Lucy and Lucky immediately started playing.  Lucy kept head butting Lucky and was trying to bite his tail.  It was funny to watch.  She didn’t think a whole lot of the bowling ball, but gave it a couple of shoves with her nose.

I also had her eat dog food out of my hand and this time she let me pat her back.  I think her whole trip around the neighborhood made her a little friendlier to us.  They say pigs are smart.  Smart as a dog, I’ve heard.  Maybe, just maybe, she had some escaper’s remorse yesterday while she was off gallivanting with the dogs.  Maybe there was a bit of panic in her heart that she was truly lost.  Maybe there was no tussling with the neighbor because she was relieved that someone knew where she belonged.  Maybe she thought “There’s no place like home.”

Maybe we should have named her Dorothy.

Dorothy Houdini.

BFFs

"This is my command:  Love each other."  John 15:17

An update on our pig growing adventure... 

Lucy gets bigger everyday.  Bigger and bigger and bigger. 

She still doesn't think too much of the human lifeform, but she loves Lucky. 

She also loves dogfood.  She may be suffering from an identity crisis. 

Currently, here's how the feed goes at our house:

• The chickens like pigfood. 
• The pig likes dogfood.
• The dog likes chickens. 

It's a full circle of life.... and death.

Anyway, the dog has not acquired a taste for pig ears or pig feet just yet, which is a good thing because she loves him.

They play and run together.  It is really quite funny.  Then Lucky will lie down and Lucy will root him with her nose.  He doesn't think too much of this, but it is fun to watch. 

Sorry for the angle.  She's not aware this isn't her best side.  Or maybe it is!  Isn't that a pork butt?  Mmmm.....  Pulled pork sandwiches.... 

The neighbor dog isn't allowed in with the pig or chickens, so she watches from the outside. 

When Lucky is out but not in the barn with Lucy, she runs the fence and grunts at him when she can see him.

Such good friends are they... 

 
We suspect she will probably be tough from running with the dog and from the kids. 

I'll let you know in a few more months. 

Maybe. 

Lucy

"The pig is also unclean; although it has a split hoof, it does not chew the cud.  You are not to eat their meat or touch their carcasses."  Deuteronomy 14:8

Guess what we got? 

Isn't she lovely?  The kids named her Lucy and then told her we were going to kill her and eat her.  We'll see how that goes. 

This is me pig wrestling with her on her first night. 

My husband really enjoyed it. 

I put the dog harness on her because she was less than cooperative and I didn't want to carry a screaming pig all the way to the barn.  This got her away from my ear at least.  Plus, it gave me something to grab a hold of.  Pigs are kind of like bullets. 

Ever been in a greased pig contest? 

I have. 
I didn't win. 

Lucy became a new roommate for the chickens.  They were scared to death of her.  One chicken was injured in all the uproar.  One pig's feelings were forever scarred. 

The next morning she was a bit more friendly.  We introduced her to the dog.  Lucky initially acted like he was going to eat her, but then decided it would be more fun to play with her.  Unfortunately the pig didn't speak dog.  She just didn't get it at first.  Finally she started chasing after the dog and a beautiful friendship was born.  Lucky and Lucy - BFFs. 

Someone asked me if I could eat my dog's best friend.  Hmmm. 

Only time will tell.

Pigs, Sheep, and Throwing Dice

"I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand."  John 10:28

Have I told you the story about Piggy? Well, I was in 8th grade and I took home a runt from my stepdad’s father’s pig farm to raise as my own. I kept her in a box on my dresser and got up every two hours through the night to feed her with a baby bottle. My stepdad cared for her during the day.

Anyway, she was pink and cute and had a tiny little grunt. I’m not sure how long she stayed in the box, but the time came when she was strong enough to be moved outside. We put up a barricade in a walled-in area between the house and the carport and left her outside for her first night as a real pig.
 We’d also gotten a new dog named Kim sometime that week. She was purportedly a coon hound, and she was all black and definitely pregnant. She was also quite the fence climber, I learned the next morning.


I went out first thing to check on my pig, and Kim ran to the barricade, jumped over, and sat by my dead Piggy that she was proud that she had killed. She sat and wagged her tail violently. She’d bit her right across her spine and probably broke her back.


I was horrified. I cried and cried.


My mom still made me go to school that day. (For the record, I believe pig dying is worth a day off school now.) So there I stood outside of the band room at Will Rogers Junior High crying, and waiting for the bell to ring for us to go in. Kids would come up and ask me what was wrong. They gave me funny looks when I said, “My p-p-p-pig died!”


It was one of my more traumatic hick moments as a child.


Last night, I was asked to be a sub for a Bunco gathering. I hadn’t played Bunco in five years, but I was pretty sure I could figure it out again. I was the first one to show up and didn’t have any idea if I’d know anyone else there besides the friend that called me to sub. My friend Amy came too, so that made two people I knew.


Anyway, I was stuck with the ghost as a partner at the head table for most of the evening and eventually won “Most Wins”. They said they won’t be inviting me back. Amy said I cheated. Apparently you can’t win the first time you play with a group you don’t know. Unwritten Bunco code, or something.


We all stood around after the game and started telling stories. Lo and behold, Amy told of a traumatic adolescent farm animal death that had happened to her!


She said that even though she lived in town, she would visit her friend out in the country. Her friend had a myriad of animals to play with and raised baby lambs. As luck would have it, one of the lambs was a runt that year, so the friend and Amy had nursed the baby lamb in a box by the stove for weeks. Amy said that every weekend she would go to her friend’s house to check on the baby sheep.


The time finally came when the lamb was strong enough to be set out into the world. And guess what?


Her friend’s dad ran over it.


She and her friend were so distraught over the death of the sheep that the father almost cried too.


And so it was, through Bunco and stories of traumatic farm animal death, that Amy became more solidified in my mind as a Hick Sister.

May you be able to bond with your friends over less traumatic memories!